HOW TO BE AN EARLY RISER EACH DAY

“Each night, when I go to sleep, I die. And the next morning, when I wake up, I am reborn.”

Mahatma Ghandi

When we sleep at night and wake up in the morning, we are re-energize by a natural phenomenon which all living things undergo. We all sleep and we all want to wake early either to prepare for work or to take care of some special activity for the day.

Sleep is God’s gift to mankind and also to the lower animals. I keep on pondering that if we are to be living in a world where sleep is not recognized, how will the human function and how will the world function too.

There are several things that we can do without as humans but we cannot do without sleep.

In my teens and early twenties, I used to sleep late at night because I want to watch one movie or the other and then will obey nature’s call by 12pm, 1am or even stay awake until like 4am all because of a movie. During the day, I still find time to take my siesta. This was my daily sleep routine. As the years go by, when I began to develop my mental ability and then begin to study and to make research, I found out that too much sleep will only lead me to poverty.

So I began to look for ways how I could reduce the time I spent on sleeping and then use that time for myself. “There is a school of thought that says, early to bed is early to rise”. While in my late teens and early twenties, I used to believe that myth but as the years go by I stand to disagree with that thought. I know right now that some of you reading this article will say why? It is a fact that it is not by going to bed early that will make you rise early but by you keeping up to some rules that will keep you up early. Standing by the tenet of a rule can only be done by a strong willed person and not by a lazy fellow.

Sleep is a linking bridge between reality and fantasy, so make sure you are able to make good use of both phase. Have you ever seen anyone that has been able to cheat nature by not sleeping?

If yes, it might be for a night and that individual will still feel dizzy during the day because he did not invent sleep, so make sure you make use of your night to sleep but if you still can’t, try and make use of some hours in the day.

There was a time, I was writing a script for someone and the next day, I have to be at a location for a movie shoot. It was not easy for me but I was able to write all through the night until about 6 to 7am, after which I went to sleep and woke up around 10 or 11am. Most times that particular night, I found myself nodding off and later regaining consciousness. During that period, I missed type and missed spelt some words but have to correct the errors during my conscious mode.

Most times, when I am writing during the day, I still feel dizzy but if I have to close my eyes for about 5 minutes, I will regain health and consciousness again. We all have a winning formular and should introduce it into our sleep life.

Do you ever believe that one can pattern or control the way he or she sleeps at night? If you do not believe it is possible because I want to use myself as a case study.

Since mid – 2008, I started to reduce the time I spent at night for sleep and it has been working for me and it will also work for you if you practice the steps that I used. Though we are different human being but we all undergo adaptation. All human are prone to adaptation and if you can adapt to anything then you are on your way to success.

Like I said before, since 2008 till date, I am always up by 3 am except I decide to sleep for extra 30 minutes or an hour. This is not a fairy tale but it is a reality that is going on in my life and I am happy that I was able to sacrifice some things to get to that stage in my life.

I will also want to discuss what a senior colleague told me 2006. He is working with a Federal Government owned company in Nigeria and he wakes up daily for work at about 4 am daily to get to work before 7 am. This colleague of mine has gotten adapted to this routine that during his leave period from work he still finds it difficult to sleep beyond 4 am at home.

All through 2008 till date this has been my life style and I’m having fun with it. It has help me improve in a lot of things and also increase my productivity.

I know you are eager to get this tip and practice it to know how it works.

Eat right or eat early:

What do I mean by this? I am not here to tell you what to eat or not but to tell you how to eat.

According to research, food digestion varies between individuals and it may take about 6-8 hours or more for this food to digest in the human body.

So, eating right or eating early is off essence if you must sleep well and wake up at the right time.

Any time I’m home I make sure that I eat my dinner at most 8:30pm and if I have to come home late hungry, then I must eat light or take a little quantity.

In as much as we need food for healthy living, we should not abuse it because it will definitely hurt us.

Whenever I eat right at night, I feel very comfortable the next morning and if I have to be awake throughout the night, I don’t feel any discomfort.

Do not use sleep enhancer drugs:

Most people have the habit of using some drug enhancer to boost their night rest, which is very bad. Being addicted to any drug enhancer will keep you away from achieving your set time to an early rise.

Man was created to fall asleep naturally and to wake up naturally but when you introduce any enhancer, you have created a room for something that will take you time to eradicate from your body structure.

Sleep early:

When I decided that I want to be up every morning by 3am, I have to work on the time that I sleep. I always make sure that once it’s 10 or 10:30pm, I should be sleeping. But any day that I can’t sleep at that set time, I will make sure that I must go to bed before 12pm.

As I continue on this routine, my body got used to it that when it gets to 10pm each night, I start to get dizzy, meaning that my body has adapted to this sleep partner.

You might say that it is a bit too early. The reason why I settled for those time range, is to have at least 4 hours of sleep time each night and with that I am good for the day’s activities.

Make use of an alarm:

An alarm? Yes, it is the key object to your early rise each day. For me to achieve what I set out for, I have to make use of the alarm in phone.

We don’t have an excuse because every mobile phone comes with an alarm which we can make use of. I always make sure that my phone is closer to my head, so that when it rings, I will respond by standing up and it did a lot of good to me.

So make sure that your alarm is always on the standby each day, to achieve the desired goal.

Be discipline:

For me to have achieved this, I have to discipline my body but I must confess that it wasn’t easy.

There are days that I don’t feel like standing up and even if I do, my body will still want to sleep.

As the days go by, I began to get use to waking up when my alarm rings and I am so glad that I put myself through the test.

One of the benefit that I now enjoy is that, most times I even wake up before the alarm rings, which means that my body has subconsciously adjusted to that time. I must confess that it is not easy to start this exercise but with time it will be a part of you.

If you really seek to be an early riser then you must adhere to these tips that I have make use of for the past years and see if you won’t be an early riser.

Gideon Augustine Obonugo is a prolific freelance writer from Nigeria who has been writing for a living since 2008.
He started his own free wordpress blog two years ago before finally re-branding this blog in November 2017.
Conscious growth has been the core focus of my life for years. I try to analyze myself daily and directly or indirectly study the minds of people and how they integrate it for growth.